


Coming Back

by sumhowe_sailing



Category: Raffles - E. W. Hornung
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, M/M, POV Raffles, mentions of narcotic use/withdrawal, mostly just angst, with a tiny slice of fluff right at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-15
Updated: 2017-07-15
Packaged: 2018-12-02 12:21:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11509332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sumhowe_sailing/pseuds/sumhowe_sailing
Summary: What if Bunny hadn't answered Mr. Maturin's ad? What if Raffles had to go looking for him?





	Coming Back

In spite of my nervous excitement after placing that ad, I could not help worrying that it wouldn’t be as simple as I’d hoped. What if the telegram went astray and Bunny never even saw it? What if Bunny saw it but didn’t want the job? What if he’d moved on with his life? And try though I might to ignore these nagging concerns, by the end of the week when I still had not found him, the possibility that finding Bunny again would not be so easy seemed almost definite. The doctor was getting impatient of my stubborn refusal of every candidate—impatient and, I daresay, a bit suspicious—but I simply couldn’t bear to have anyone else around me. So, unable to back out of my scheme in any other way, I began arranging to fake my death.   

It was not difficult. Another doctor may have been more rigorous in his final diagnosis, but I had chosen mine well (and paid well for another fellow’s assistance). Even if it did mean the loss of a job, my fellow was only too glad to have the cantankerous and erratic Mr. Maturin off his hands. The question then, of course, became what now? I had determined long before I got back to this miserable little island that I could not live without my Bunny beside me. Naively, I had thought that my mere presence in the city would somehow draw him back to me—he’d never been able to stay away before. And yet, the ad had not brought him.  I had no doubt that I would find him quickly enough once I started actively looking, but in the meantime, there were lodgings and pseudonyms and means to consider.

A quick job one evening—nothing fancy or exciting, merely the basest crime for necessity’s sake—put me up well enough to live cozily while I made my discreet inquiries. I was more cautious, perhaps, than strictly necessary, but being around all our old haunts trying to find some lingering whiff of him had me on edge. My recent hardships had made me wary of life, and my nerves had always been better when I had Bunny at my side. Perhaps it was simply the need to perform for him or perhaps his presence really was that calming, but since he had burst back into my life those years ago I could not deny that I seemed to always be in top-form when I had him near.

Perhaps my excess of discretion was the reason for my complete lack of success. Or perhaps his disgrace had made him a taboo subject. Or perhaps there was simply no news to be had. In any case, I learned nothing of my Bunny from any corner that I had counted on. I had spent weeks in making these inquiries, trying not to attract any notice by asking questions too obvious or too often. By the end of them, I had begun to entertain a host of wild ideas about where he could be. It occurred to me that perhaps I had mistaken the length of his imprisonment; but it was easy enough to find old newspaper accounts to confirm that he had indeed been released by now. In the end I had to concede that he had simply left every aspect of his old life behind and had gone to ground living an inconspicuous life elsewhere. Well, if Bunny had a new den, I would simply have to track him to it.

 

Sadly that thought proved to be more literal than I’d anticipated. I began by frequenting bars, buying drinks for strangers, trying to worm out any detail I could from them. If I knew Bunny—and I was sure there was no one who knew him better, not even himself—there was one habit he would never be able to give up. If I was going to find him, I was almost certain it would be alcohol that pointed the way. I made no progress at first. Gradually, once I was certain I had picked the memory of every regular in the bars where I had started, I had to shift my search. As I ruled out more and more bars, I moved further and further into the darker, grimier parts of London, far removed from all the elegant clubs and fine establishments in our old area.

It was not difficult, insinuating myself into the seedy pubs no gentleman could enter. I had never lost my knack for accents, though I had to rebuild my disguises from scratch. They required an entirely different sort of tact to get any information from them, but that, too, was a skill I had long since mastered. Yet in spite of all my best efforts, my search went on and on without turning up anything useful. It never crossed my mind, I should say, to give it up. Bunny and I had had our rough patches, our silent patches, but once he’d come back into my life I had learned quickly that I simply couldn’t do without him.

Finally, one night as I was lurking in a bar that I was about ready to give up on, a man slouched in in a daze and drew my eye. To this day I couldn’t tell you what it was about him that tipped me off, but somehow I simply knew that he would lead me to Bunny. I watched him order a cheap and revolting beer—watched him struggle to produce the coins for it. I watched him as he sipped it, set it down, and seemed to forget it was there as he stared blankly around the pub. And when he left a while later, I followed him. He did not go far; in his state I would have been amazed if he _could_ have gone much farther.

He disappeared into the sort of seedy, run-down place one must either be exceptionally brave, exceptionally foolish, or exceptionally desperate to enter. I will leave it to you to decide which trait brought me inside. The thick, sweet, smoky air at once confirmed a suspicion that had been growing on me almost since I’d set eyes on that fellow back in the bar: this was an opium den.

I had lost my man in the haze, which blurred all the solid edges of reality, but he no longer mattered. I was dreadfully certain that Bunny was here somewhere, all I had to do was look.

It was a ghastly scene, one which I would much prefer to forget. Room after room—even the hallways—filled with…well, I will not describe them. I will only say that when I finally _did_ find my Bunny in that revolting place, I very nearly did not recognize him. He was entirely too thin, his complexion sallow, his hair still cropped short—good lord. How much of this change was from his time here, and how much was from his time in prison? I would never know. It was as if all the life had been drained from him. He simply lay there, eyes half open, gazing at the world through a mist, not seeing it. Not seeing me.

“Bunny, old chap,” I whispered, leaning over him, trying to let him have a clear look at me, “it’s me.”

He stared into my eyes for a long time, but the fog over his gaze did not lift.

“You’re not Raffles. I’ve had this dream before. He’s dead.”

“Bunny, dear, dear Bunny. It _is_ me. I’m here.”

“No you’re not. Raffles is dead. I know he is. I know it—because…” his eyes seemed to be either sliding further out of focus or struggling to come into it. He shook his head and then, as if by a great effort of will, went on. “I know you’re dead because when I got out, I needed you. I needed Raffles, and he wasn’t there. So I knew you were dead because Raffles has always been there for me when I needed him. Being dead is the only thing that would have kept you away…” He trailed off again. It was as if, in the first rush of adrenaline that came from finding him, I did not notice how deeply his words wounded me. But when he turned his head away and refused to look at me any longer, I noticed. I felt every word of it.

He really believed that. Bunny, my ever faithful Bunny, had not cared that he’d seen me dive into the sea all those miles from land—the entire time he’d been in prison, he had believed I was alive. He had trusted in me, as he had always trusted in me. And I had let him down. After all the crimes I had committed, this was the first time I ever felt truly guilty for anything. As he and I rebuilt what we had, it would come to be a familiar feeling; but at the time it frightened me. I did not know what to do with this new emotion. So I got angry.

“Now really, Bunny, what nonsense. I’m right here. No matter where I’ve been—I’ll tell you all about it some other time—I’m here _now_.”

He looked up at me again, as blankly as before, and simply said, “No. You’re not. You’re not real.”

I slapped him. I had not meant to—I just _needed_ to get some reaction, some spark of life back into him. “Was _that_ real?”

“Raffles would never hurt me,” he said, closing his eyes once more. That was the second time I felt that pang of guilt. The pang was quickly followed by the realization that I was making a scene. I could feel several pairs of dim eyes on me—and even despite their lack of focus or comprehension, that attention was just what I did not want. I gazed on Bunny’s changed face for a moment more, barely restraining myself from reaching out to caress it, before tearing myself away.

 

I did not go far. I only needed to wait outside long enough for the insensate people inside to forget what had just happened, and then I could try again. It should not take long. I would be more careful now. Maybe…maybe Bunny really would think all that had been an opium dream. Maybe I could start over. I didn’t even need to tell him who I was yet, not if _that_ was how the conversation was going to go. I could simply take him home with me, get him sober…and one day, he would wake up, and I would be there. And he would know. I would not have to tell him that I was real, I would not have to convince him that I was still alive. He would be able to rely on his senses to tell him that.

I don’t know how long I managed to wait outside. Of all the tough spots I’d ever been in, this one strained my nerves the most. It was one of the few times I have not been master of myself. Usually, you see, it was only a matter of putting myself at risk, and that never bothered me much. Sometimes it had been a matter of risking Bunny, but if I knew I could get him out of it then I could bear it. But now… Now I could not get that picture of him, little more than a breathing corpse, from my mind. Now I had lived without him long enough to know how desperately I needed him back. Now I had seen what happened when I failed and he paid for it. I couldn’t fail this time. I couldn’t. So when I strolled back into the den, as casually as I could manage, it may have been altogether sooner than I’d intended. Certainly I drew some suspicious looks from those parties still alert enough to register my entrance.

I tried not to walk straight back to where I knew him to be. I tried not to be too obviously the same man who had just stormed out. But my anxious excitement refused to be restrained, and I was at his side again in moments. I cannot tell you how deeply hurt I was to see that he had been crying since I’d left. He had stopped by the time I returned, but his eyes were now puffy and red and his cheeks were still damp. Had my slap hurt him? Or had he thought he’d lost me all over again? Or did my Bunny have reasons to cry that I would never know about? No. No that could not be. I would get him sorted out, and soon enough he would be an open book to me once more, just as he had always been before. He _had_ to be.

Getting him out of that miserable pit turned out to be a bigger job than I’d anticipated. He did not want to leave, and the proprietor would not let him go until his bill was paid up. No amount of charm would budge the man, so at length I was forced to leave him behind while I went to work scrounging up the cash. It took nearly three days to do it. I could not tackle any grand cribs, not without my partner in crime, so I had to crack a few small places to make up the difference (he’d run up quite a debt). And then of course there was the time it took to discreetly dispose of my wares. What an agony those days were! It was all I could do to stop myself going back and wringing the proprietor’s neck and taking Bunny home by force. If I hadn’t been so desperate to avoid a scandal, who knows but I might have done it.

 

Eventually I had raised the sum and felt prepared to face the proprietor. Whether or not I was equally prepared to face Bunny again, I could not have said. Suppose he recognized me and we went through that entire agonizing conversation all over again? Suppose he remembered our last conversation—remembered me striking him? Suppose he called me by my name once we were out on the street and gave it all away? Nevertheless, the suppositions must be set aside. Bunny had to be brought home. He had to be taken care of. So I donned my disguise and slouched back to that den of sinners.

Bunny was lying precisely where I had left him; if he had moved at all in those long days, there was no sign of it. I had half-hoped that my imagination had exaggerated the extent of his pitiful condition, but if anything he looked more wan and sickly and vacant than I had remembered. Much as I wanted to, this time I did not speak to him first. I simply hauled him to his feet and half dragged, half carried him out of there. He made feeble protests, but he did not have the will to struggle. The proprietor met us at the door with protests of his own, but I silenced him with the cash and the coldest glare I dare say I have ever given anyone.

We did not get far before it became abundantly clear that my rabbit was in no state to walk all the way back to our rooms—yes, _our_ rooms, though he had never yet set foot in them—and something else would have to be done. I scooped him into my arms and carried him a few blocks, but I was not the man I had once been and I am embarrassed to admit how quickly the effort became too much for me. Fortunately I had coin enough left to hire a hansom cab, though it was a devil of a time finding one in that part of the city.

There is not much left to tell. Or rather, there is far too much to say, and I have not my dear Bunny’s skill with words, so I will not try to describe it. I do not think I would want to linger on the details, even if I could. Only let me say that during those days after getting Bunny back home, as I nursed him and sat sleeplessly, wordlessly by his side night and day, I learned an awful lesson in addiction—and an even more awful one in guilt. The things he would say as he drifted in his subconscious state! I never knew which hurt me more: his vague descriptions of the terrors he saw and the terrors he had lived through, or his unending praise of me, which seemed a mockery, so little did I deserve it. Worst of all were the times when he was beyond words entirely, simply screaming or writhing silently, in immeasurable pain as I sat uselessly by, unable to do a thing.

He did not come back to himself all at once. It was not, as I had imagined, a matter of waking up one day with a clear mind. It was a series of days—weeks—some of which would be cloudy, while others seemed alright. He slid between levels of awareness at odd moments without warning. I shall never forget one conversation, he had been lucid for several hours and I really thought he’d be himself for good, when of a sudden he looked around, then looked hard at me, and reached for my hand.

“Oh Raffles,” he’d gasped, “I understand it now. You didn’t come back to me—I came to you. I’m dead, aren’t I, old chap?”

It would do no good, me describing how I felt then, or how I felt any of the other scores of times when I had to reassure Bunny that he and I were both very much alive, that we were together again, and that nothing would come between us anymore. It’s no use me going on about the confessions I made him then, and have since often repeated, just to be sure he does not forget. I will not tire you by describing how natural it was for him to wake screaming in the middle of the night, and for me to crawl into his bed and hold him and comfort him until he slept soundly, or how I began sharing his bed regardless, just in case. What would be the point in telling you things you already know?

But then, I suppose you might ask, if that be the case, why did I write this at all? For you, darling rabbit, for you. So you know how much I love you, and need you. So that, if there should come a day when you are in doubt and I am not here to tell you so, you may still hear me say to you how I feel, and how I came to know those feelings, and how deeply sincere they are. Believe me, Bunny, believe me. I will not let you down again.

**Author's Note:**

> wow I'm so bad at titles. also, due to lack of personal experience here, sorry if my depictions of opium dens/withdrawal are super off, I'm just working with a vague recollection of something I read a few years ago.


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